On Thursday the Census Bureau reported September Retail Sales. “Advance estimates of U.S. retail and food services sales for September 2024, adjusted for seasonal variation and holiday and trading-day differences, but not for price changes, were $714.4 billion, an increase of 0.4% from the previous month, and up 1.7% from September 2023.” Wall Street had forecast a 0.3% increase, so this counted as a beat and was viewed as positive. The S&P 500 spiked to an all time high on the open and the 10-year Treasury yield rose by 0.08% to 4.096%.
As the statement noted the Census...